1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a video photo system and a complexion converting apparatus and, more particularly, to a video ID photo printing apparatus and a complexion converting apparatus capable of correcting or converting the complexion of a person as an object into a desired color.
2. Description of the Related Art
In a known apparatus, an ID photo print is printed out by a full-color video printer on the basis of a portrait image signal received by a video image pickup apparatus or is stored in a filing device and arbitrarily read to be displayed on a monitor or printed out.
FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a video ID pickup apparatus disclosed in Published Unexamined Japanese Patent Application No. 63-316275. In FIG. 1, a face image of a person 2 as an object is picked up by a color television (TV) camera 4 to obtain an RGB signal. The RGB signal is converted into a digital signal by an A/D converter 6 and temporarily stored in a frame memory 8. The image data stored in the frame memory 8 is calculated by an image processor 10 having a look-up table memory 10a, a look-up table 10b, an adder 10c, and the like to remove a color impurity caused by incorrect spectral light-absorbing factors of a color medium.
Image data output from the image processor 10 is supplied to a full-color video printer 12 having a look-up table memory 12a, a video RAM 12B, a D/A converter 12c, a selector 12d, a CRT controller 12e, a CRT display 12f, a printing unit 12g, a development process unit 12h, and the like. In FIG. 1, reference numeral 14 denotes a controller for controlling the system as a whole. The controller 14 controls a memory 16, a keyboard 18, a floppy disk 20, and the like.
In an ID card printing apparatus with the above arrangement, a full-color image obtained by synthesizing and editing a picked up video image and a graphic image electrically produced at the portion of the controller 14 is printed out by the video printer 12.
In the above video ID photo printing apparatus, it is important that a printed complexion of a person is optimal and that an operation and handling for keeping the complexion optimal are easily performed.
Reproduction of a complexion is influenced by an illumination light source, controls of adjusting means of the video image pickup apparatus, and printer characteristics of the video printer. More specifically, when a photo studio is not used, the optical quality of an illumination is largely changed. The number of portions to be controlled of video image pickup equipment such as a color TV camera is increased. In addition, an image observed through a monitor and a printed image are largely different from each other in impression. In addition, a long time is required for printing the image. For this reason, it is very difficult to perform the adjusting operation.
An apparatus of this type is used by professionals specializing in card formation, and the above difficulty is overcome. However, when cards are unusually formed by ordinary persons, the stability and maintenance of reproduction of a complexion are very difficult. Therefore, operations for stabilizing and maintaining the reproduction are very complicated and require a long time.